


Butterfly Kisses

by Uhmeduh



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Rating May Change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-26
Updated: 2021-01-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 19:06:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,643
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25520311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Uhmeduh/pseuds/Uhmeduh
Summary: Before Sally Jackson ever meets Poseidon, she sits on a hard plastic chair in a hospital and receives a golden butterfly necklace. Perhaps she will never meet Poseidon this time.
Relationships: Sally Jackson/Thanatos
Comments: 2
Kudos: 25





	1. SALLY I

Sally Jackson was a special woman. It was a fact that transcended even universes. She was an author, a dreamer, and soon she would be the mother to a demigod.

But not quite yet.

At the current moment, she had yet to even meet her little prince’s father. In one world, she found her inspiration by the sea, writing there day and night and catching the sight of the god of the sea. But that meeting took place after the death of her uncle, and not in this universe. Here, Sally sat on a hard plastic hospital chair, a pencil pressing hard against the callous on her middle finger as she wrote descriptions of each person she saw in the waiting room, trying to distract herself from the inevitability of her uncle’s death. He was not a good man, no, but he was family, and Sally held that above everything.

She looked up once again but this time her eyes met golden ones almost immediately. The man had simply been glancing to the side as he walked, but he stopped abruptly when their eyes locked. Sally was distracted momentarily by his beauty, he was what she imagined an angel would look like. The large feathered wings she saw on his back further helped solidify the image. 

Her words clogged her throat as the man— angel— whatever he was pulled out an iPad to jot something down before slipping it back into his pocket. She noticed only now that he seemed to be wearing black robes and that his pocket disappeared as soon as he took his hand out of it. It was weird for her, normally so observant, to not see something like that immediately.

“Who are you?” His words were quick and almost sharp. She was sure that coming from anyone else’s lips she would find them harsh and take offence. Even now her rebellious nature told her to square her shoulders and sit up straighter, not allowing his good looks to sway her. She had done nothing wrong by looking at him. Something about him was so familiar. She felt like she knew him, had seen him before.

“Sally Jackson, if it means anything to you.” She almost hoped it did, maybe for once in her life she would get an explanation for the déjà vu she sometimes felt, the same déjà vu that was so strong at this moment. 

It didn’t it seemed as the man still stared at her with those piercing golden eyes and reached out to touch her hair. She immediately pulled away, despite the desire to lean into the touch. She was ashamed that she was more attracted to this man than she had been to any boyfriends or girlfriends she had prior, but that was still no reason for him to just touch her like that.

He looked almost amused now, a small smile forming onto his features. “And I am Thanatos, Sally Jackson.” His hand went back into his pocket and he pulled out a necklace, a simple golden butterfly attached to a fine golden chain. He dropped it into a hand that she didn’t even realize was outstretched as she stared up at him. “Write me something, we will meet again.” 

Sally blinked and he was gone. She stared at the chain in her hand, the only sign he had ever been there. Slowly, she put it on, the feeling of the cold metal against the back of her neck being almost comforting to her. She turned the page of her notebook and picked her pen back up, unsure when it had fallen to the ground. She was about to start writing when a nurse called her name and guided her into a separate room. 

“I’m sorry to have to tell you this, dear, but your uncle just passed. We did everything we could to try and save him, he struggled and held on for so much longer than most people do.” Her eyes were kind but she was tired, Sally could tell that she was likely nearing the end of a very long shift.

“I understand.” She did her best to give the woman an understanding smile. She really did understand. Sally had no hatred or fear of death, though she still allowed herself to feel sad when those she loved passed. She wasn’t sure what religion she believed in, but she knew that she would see them again when she herself died. And her uncle had been a bit of a dick anyway. “He wanted to be cremated when he died. Said he never trusted graveyards, and he didn’t want to be part of the zombie apocalypse when it did happen.” She laughed, unaware of the tear running down her cheek until she instinctively reached up to wipe it away. Why was she crying?

“I understand. Would you like a moment with the body?” The nurse, Sally regretted not asking her name because now her eyes were brimming with tears she hadn’t expected and she had no chance of reading the name tag now.

“No. No, it’s okay. I said my goodbyes on the way here. We expected this.” She said her goodbyes every time she took him to the hospital, just in case. This time, it had mattered. This time was the final goodbye.

Sally returned to her seat after finishing things up with the nurse only to see it taken by a young boy playing with a toy car. That was fine, she didn’t need it anymore, and she hadn’t left any of her things there. The butterfly still felt cool against her chest but it was surprisingly comforting. She drove back to the house she had lived in with her uncle. It was small and out of town, in a place where the city lights could be seen but the city couldn’t be heard or felt anymore. Sally collapsed into her bed, feeling so much older than she actually was. She would’ve been graduating high school in a week, getting her diploma, if not for her uncle’s cancer.

Time passed both quickly and slowly, but never in between. Before she knew it, months had passed. She used her uncle’s remaining money to hold his funeral, thankfully she didn’t have to buy a plot of land for his body. His friends were not rich, but they gave her what they could. Their family was practically non existent, he had been the only family she had left aside from maybe some distant cousins. She got to keep the house because his mortgage had been paid off and he had left everything to her, but her job was far and the car was old and she didn’t know how long it would hold out on her. Sally didn’t know how she had gotten to this point in her life, but she was taking it one step at a time as she did with everything else.

At the beginning of a week long vacation that had practically been forced upon her by the elderly owner of the restaurant that she worked at, she saw him once again. This time, she was clearly his target. He wasn’t wearing robes anymore, this time he just wore a black t-shirt and black jeans. Perhaps a little too much black to be considered normal, but it definitely wasn’t weird. His golden eyes were shining and he sat down across from her. She had been enjoying a sunny morning by having a cup of coffee on the patio of her favourite bakery.

Sally had so many things to ask him. She had somehow found the time to research in between all the funeral preparations and she had discovered that Thanatos was the Greek god of death. Even before that, she had woken up on the morning after her uncle’s death and discovered that she had a streak of pure white running through her normally brown hair, right where he had touched it when she first met him. And then there was the question of how her necklace returned to her neck within an hour of her taking it off. She had taken it off to shower and forgotten to put it back on, yet it reappeared by the time she had finished making dinner for herself. Despite all these questions she had, nothing came out and Thanatos got the first word.

“What a wonderful morning.” He reached out to tuck a strand of ear behind her hair and frowned when she pulled back before his fingers got anywhere near her. “Did you write me something like I asked?”

“I haven’t had the time.” Sally reached up to tuck that same strand behind her own ear. She wasn’t exactly wanting all her hair to turn white at the age of 18 after all. “I’ve been dealing with my uncle’s funeral and everything else.” She licked her lips as she stared at him, watching how he seemed to compulsively reach towards his pocket before forcing his hand away. It wasn’t like she hadn’t written at all, but she hadn’t written anything she deemed worthy of this man. She didn’t even know why she wrote with him in mind but she felt compelled to.

Thanatos nodded and took a moment to order a coffee from a passing waitress. “You have questions, of course you do. I’m not surprised. You wonder why my parents named me after a Greek god—“

“No.” He seemed rather startled when she cut him off and he looked rather innocent and cute with his eyes all wide. “I’m wondering if you are a Greek god.” 

Sally had always had an active imagination. She had seen giant black dogs and men with one eye for as long as she could remember. Her mother had loved to tell her stories about the Greek myths as well, a twinkle in her eye when she spoke of them, especially monsters like the minotaur or Medusa. She loved them, she said, because they showed that the gods were neither kind nor fair. Because they showed that they were chaotic and untameable forces, but that they had reasonings of their own. The only gods that she had never heard her mother speak ill of were not gods but goddesses. Amphitrite, the wife of Poseidon and a goddess of the sea in her own right, was one. Her mother said that she was not always kind, but she was fair, and that she cared for anything that belonged to the sea. She remembered her poking her sides and tickling her as she said that she was included in that.

The other goddess that her mother had never spoken badly of was Artemis. In fact, she had spoken about Artemis like she was a friend, throwing in small details like how she preferred venison to beef, even though it was clearly not mentioned in the myths. Her mother also told her an odd version of the trials of Heracles, a version that she had never found in books after her death. A version with one of the Hesperides assisting Heracles in one of his tasks.

“I am.” She was taken out of her memories by those words and was rather taken aback to see Thanatos frowning at her. “I was not aware you were a demigod, in that case I shouldn’t be here.”

He went to stand and Sally’s next words slipped through her lips before she could even think them. For some reason, she was desperate to keep him there. “I’m not. It’s just... you have this air about you, and with that name... it was a bit obvious.”

Thanatos stared down at her and she couldn’t help but shiver. She only now realized how tall he was as well, his face unreadable to her. “You’re smart. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been so surprised at your guess.” He sat back down and placed a hand over hers so gently that she didn’t even realize until the waitress placed his coffee down and he took it off. She found herself longing for his touch again.

“I’m not dumb.” She frowned at him, her rebellious nature flaring up as her eyes shifted into the deceptive blue-green of deep water that only looked shallow and would drown you at a moment’s notice. Unlike most men who were taken aback by her spirit, Thanatos only seemed to be ensnared by it as his lips quirked into a smile and he leaned closer to her.

“No, no you aren’t. You remind me of a huntress, you know. They all have a gaze like that, taken from the goddess Artemis herself. A state that threatens you to underestimate them.” 

“I get it from my mother.” She sipped her coffee and tapped her nails against it periodically as they fell into a comfortable quiet.

“My hair.” She eventually said, looking to him and tilting his head. She had been looking around everywhere, unable to keep her eyes on only one spot as she read the sights and posters all around the outside of the café. Thanatos’s gaze seemingly hadn’t moved off her. He placed his hand on her’s again, this time his right hand so that he could hold his coffee in his left.

“Yes, your hair. I apologize for that, dear, I forgot just how much I needed to reel in my powers when touching mortals like you. It has been a long time since one could see me without explicitly letting myself be seen.” He brushed his thumb over her knuckles as he brought us cup up to his lips and took a long sip. “That strand shall always be white, but it won’t happen again, dear Sally. Don’t worry. My touch can kill, but I won’t reap you before your time.”

She felt comforted by that knowledge, and the white strand was quite cool to have. It was certainly distinctive. She finished her coffee and bit her lip, knowing she really couldn’t afford another at the time, especially since Thanatos had also gotten one too. His tisked upon noticing her face and shook his head.

“You think you will be paying? Hades pays well, dear, and gods have few things to spend mortal money on. Allow me to treat you.” He squeezed her hand to silence her protest, knocking back the last of his coffee as one would a shot. “In return, perhaps you would go on a walk with me? Maybe it will give you inspiration for your writing.” He winked, slipping away to go pay for their drinks. 

Sally gathered her leather messenger bag and sweater. Normally at this time of year it wasn’t needed, but it had rained only an hour ago and the air was cool. He returned with a paper bag in one hand and his other arm wrapping effortlessly around her shoulders before she even realized it was happening. She slipped out from under it, putting a little bit of space between them. It had felt nice, but she was wary of getting close to this god took quickly. She remembered what her mother had said about gods and mortals, though she had never heard of Thanatos having a demigod.

For all his pouting, Thanatos was respectful of the distance she put between them and simply walked beside her, leading her through a park and then to a nearby beach. Not to Montauk, a beach she had been planning to take a trip to, but to a small pebble beach with no one else in sight bar a few seagulls flying above. He eventually sat down by the water, smiling at her and gesturing for her to do the same.

“I love the ocean.” Sally’s eyes had often been compared to the ocean by past boyfriends, and she knew her mother’s had been the same way. It’s as a way she felt connected to her still, even if she was now dead. “It’s always changing, one of the few things you can rely on to always be that way.” She leaned back against a dead tree that had long since lost its top half. Thanatos passed her a cranberry muffin and she tore a piece off, nibbling on it and not stopping for a moment to wonder how he knew it was her favourite. “My mother loved it too.”

Her companion leaned forward, eating his own coffee flavoured muffin. “Tell me about her.” 

Sally wasn’t sure of his motivations with the question, but she wanted to tell him, and she wasn’t even surprised. In such a remarkably short period of time, she came to trust him. “I look like her in my face shape and eyes, especially my eyes. I have my dad’s hair though, at least its colour. Her hair was dark and fell in ringlets, I got this frizzy wavy mess that’s half way between her hair and dad’s.” She sighed as she pulled her knees up to her chest and rested her chin on them. “She loved Greek myth— I suppose it’s not mythology but I have nothing else to call it. She especially loved anything involving the sea or Artemis. She hated Heracles. She had this weird accent that no one could pinpoint too, mom always just shrugged it off though and said that she had created it because she thought it would be fun and then it got stuck.” Sally bit her lip and picked up a stone in the shape of an arrowhead rather than a smooth oval like the rest of the pebbles. “Never quite believed her though. She loved to read but hated television because she said it hurt her head. She taught at a university, but I can’t remember what she taught.” She rubbed her eyes and bit her lip. “She died when I was so young, from a plane crash with my father. It hurt a lot at the time, but mom always accepted the idea that she would die. Dad was more afraid, he didn’t even like to ride roller coasters apparently. But mom loved him because he was kind and honest.”

Thanatos leaned over and wiped tears off of her cheek, pulling her so that her back was pressed to his chest, an embrace that she didn’t mind. She could tell it was to comfort her, not because he was trying to pull the moves on her. She shifted so she could lay her head on his shoulder and he ran his fingers through her hair. “Her name was Estelle. Uncle Rich was dad’s brother, I appreciate him for taking care of me but I just wished that I had my mom and dad. I don’t know, I don’t wish they didn’t die, I just wish that I had more time with them, I guess. It doesn’t make sense.” 

“It makes perfect sense, Sally, and even if it didn’t, it doesn’t have to. Your mother sounds like a wise woman and your father sounds like a good man, I’m sure they are both in Elysium and you will meet them there after your own death.” He promised, his voice soft and slow. It made her want to close her eyes. Something reminded her that Thanatos and Hypnos were twins and she laughed quietly as she cuddled up to him, her arms wrapping around his torso. She was normally more rational than this, she normally didn’t fall asleep on strange men’s— god’s— whatever’s chests. But deep down, Sally was ruled by her heart, and so she let the feeling of his fingers in her hair and his voice mumbling in a language she didn’t quite understand lull her to sleep.


	2. SALLY II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It feels like it should be raining, but it isn’t. That doesn’t make him any less perfect.

Sally woke up in her bed, the scent of honey surrounding her senses. She slowly pushed herself up, blinking in surprise when she saw a folded paper butterfly and $300 in cash on her bedside table.

“What..?” She gingerly pickled up the butterfly, noticing writing on it. She loathed to unfold it, but she loathed being unable to read whatever was written more, thus she unfolded it and read. A smile slowly grew across her features and her cheeks and ears started to burn.

_Dear Sally,_

_I hope you don’t mind me carrying you to your home and placing you into bed, however I could not bear to wake you when you looked so sweet pressed against my chest. Alas, I did not want to even leave you alone yet work was calling to me so loudly I feared it might wake you anyway._

_Keep that necklace on, darling, it will keep you safe. I wish to see you soon and will try to see you as soon as I can, however I would rather it be in the mortal realm— the Underworld does not have any cute coffee shops or pebble beaches._

_The money is yours, don’t attempt to repay me. As I said, Lord Hades pays me well, despite Charon’s complaints. Buy yourself a coffee, think of me sitting across from you yet again. Look in a mirror and see your own great beauty. Perhaps this time some inspiration will strike you, or not._

_With the greatest affection,  
Thanatos Θ ___

__She pressed the letter to her chest and sighed dreamily. Placing the letter back onto her bedside table, Sally rose and walked to the mirror and ran her fingers through her hair in an attempt to fix it. She tried to ignore the lingering blush on her cheeks as she went through the motions of getting ready._ _

__The kitchen was full of food. Whereas before it had only had a few cans of various beans and vegetables, a bag of rice, some nearly expired milk, and a box of cereal, now it was completely stocked and featured fresh fruit and vegetables. She laughed quietly, shaking her head. “And when did you find the time to do this, Thanatos?” She murmured, the feeling of a warm breeze passing over her skin. She picked up an apple and bit into it. It was perfectly ripe and sweeter than any apple she had ever eaten. “Thank you.”_ _

__It was only 5 AM, which was to be expected considering she had fallen asleep around noon the day before. Sally was surprised she had even slept that long, but the work from the funeral combined with the work needed to keep herself afloat had taken a toll on her and she had been regularly sleeping less than 5 hours a night for the past month. And Thanatos’s twin brother was Hypnos. The more she thought about it, the less surprising it was that she had slept so long. She finished the apple and tossed the core into a composting bucket she had, grabbing her messenger bag to head out for the day._ _

__She had been fully intending to go to the same coffee shop as before, or maybe even go to Montauk like she had been planning, but somehow she ended up in the cemetery. She wandered aimlessly among the gravestones, there hadn’t even been enough money to get Rich a plaque here with how crowded it was. It didn’t really matter, he was cremated after all, but she still felt like she should’ve tried. She ended up sitting in front of her parents graves, running her fingers over the script on them. Her father’s grave had plain English, with his name Jim Jackson and underneath a simple line about how he was a loving husband and father. Her mother’s had always confused her. It didn’t have her maiden name and along with the line about her being a wife and mother, there was Greek text on her grave._ _

__“I miss you, mom, dad.” She murmured, falling back onto the grass and staring at the sky as the sun rose further into the sky. “Sometimes I get mad at the world because I barely have any memories of you. I question the Fates’ plans, they’ve taken my whole family from me now. What did I do to deserve that? I was just a child when you were taken. I’m barely an adult now. I don’t even have a high school diploma.” The grass tickled her forearms as she rose herself onto her elbows. The tear that slipped over the corner of her lips was as salty as the seas. “I remember you telling me about how significant it is that everyone, even girls, get an education. How much I should value it.” The silent tears turned into heavy sobs and Sally moved once again, pulling her knees to her chest, wishing it was her mother she was hugging. “Are you ashamed of me, mom? I tried. I valued my education. I worked so hard. But I couldn’t just leave Rich on his own when he got worse. And I couldn’t do my work when I spent all my time with him. I chose family, mom. There’s nothing wrong with that. Right?” She was pleading right a dead woman with no one there to hear her. She could barely breathe between her sobs and she struggled to pull herself together. She hadn’t broken down like this in years, not since she had caught her boyfriend Devin cheating on her with Jacob in the stairwell on the way to her fourth period class. She had never made there._ _

__Somehow managing to sob herself to exhaustion, Sally was startled back to reality when her tears were being wiped away with possibly the softest tissue in existence. “I thought you knew death was nothing to cry about, dear.” Thanatos’s words were smooth as usual, but they sounded tinged with worry and she could see the subtle tenseness in his otherwise emotionless expression. He gathered her into his arms and sat down, in his robes once again, placing her in his lap. With fingers running through her hair, he took a moment before speaking again. “I felt your sadness and despair, I worried the worst had happened. Yet I find you crying over two people that are long dead and that happily await seeing you in Elysium one day. Two people that I guarantee wish you wouldn’t cry over them when you could be smiling instead.” Sally’s sobs had stopped, but the tears still came and he brushed one off her cheek with his thumb, peering at the droplet on his thumb almost in curiosity. “So tell me dearest, why are you so sad?”_ _

__Sally did not answer after a minute. Instead, she spent the time looking at him, noticing how his hair fell past his shoulders and looked as if it was made of the finest, darkest silk. When they had met at the coffee shop it had been tied back at the nape of his neck but now it hung free. She did not even answer after two minutes, choosing to instead spend that time looking at his face as a whole. His skin was dark and with a smoothness that teenagers and adults alike strove for, completely untouched by scars or the like. His lips could only be described by her as tempting and she made a point to avoid looking at them. She did answer after three minutes, though she spent some time staring into the molten gold he had somehow infused into his eyes. “I’m not crying because they’re dead.” She was disgusted by the hoarseness of her voice and wished for some tea to sooth it, but there was no tea in a cemetery. “I’m crying because I have no one. Sure, it’s because they’re dead and Uncle Rich is dead, but it would be the same if they had just moved away and I could never talk to them or see them.” Sally shocked herself by her own bitterness, but Thanatos looked at her with that calm but understanding expression and those eyes full of heat and she found herself continuing. She thought he would judge her but he didn’t. He didn’t at all. “I’m alone. I don’t even have any friends because I was so focussed on my studies in school and then I had to leave school. I have no family, no friends, no diploma. I have a minimum wage job. I guess I have a houseplant.” Her frustration bled into her tone. She was barely keeping the plant alive and she knew it, but it wasn’t her fault that the thing could never get enough water._ _

__Thanatos pressed his lips to her temple and her heart stopped for a moment before it started again, beating harder and louder in her chest than ever before. “We are friends, Sally, are we not?” She wanted to protest, they hadn’t known each other for that long, but he sounded so honest and the words made her faulty heart flutter. “Your family can never be brought back nor should they, but you will meet them again eventually. You can make more friends. You can go back to school and get your diploma, it’s not too late.” He rubbed his hand up and down her back, probably able to feel her heart by now. “As for plants...” he cleared his throat, “you really don’t need plants, but if you like having it, then it’s good you have it.”_ _

__He was absolutely perfect in her eyes. He was worse than a piece of chocolate her friend asked her to hold onto for her and not eat. Worse, she thought, though honestly she couldn’t be sure, than Pandora being given the pithos and being told not to open it. She had never expected the god of death to be so sweet. His face wasn’t very expressive, but his words were so kind and his voice was so soft and his gestures added onto a number of good things about him that made her heart decide he was the perfect man— god— whatever. He was the perfect everything. She had never understood why people in the myths would choose to be with gods. She knew most didn’t have a choice, that Zeus didn’t understand the concept of consent, but there were people like Hyacinthus that chose to be with Apollo despite it all. It had always seemed so foolish to her. But now she understood, if these other gods were anything like Thanatos was, she might’ve also chosen to be with them._ _

__Even if she wasn’t... technically with Thanatos._ _

__Even if she had zoned out slightly as she thought about the lips she had purposefully not looked at only fo zone back in to see Thanatos looking at her in amusement. She prided herself on already being able to see the little signs in his face like the crinkling by his eyes that showed his amusement despite his lips still not resembling any form of smile._ _

__“I’m glad you feel better, Sally,” he whispered quietly and this time he did smile. It warmed her to the core and she was certain her blood had rushed straight to her face based on how it was feeling. “I hate to see you sad as you are. You deserve nothing but happiness.”_ _

__“Thank you, Thanatos...” she whispered, looking up at him. “I’m sorry to be taking you from your work, I know you’re busy.” A part of her found her words amusing, after all, he was the one that had chosen to come to her. Yet another part pointed out he had come because of care for her, and that comforted her._ _

__“Eh.” His flippant response made her laugh quietly and she wiped the final remnants of tears from her eyes and off her cheeks. “As a god I’m capable of splitting my consciousness. As the god of death I’m especially talented at it. Part of me is here, with you, and yet other parts are still collecting souls. Another part is sitting in a meeting with Lord Hades, he‘s a bit annoyed with me for not paying complete attention to him.” He tucked the strand of hair behind her ear and pressed a kiss to the space on her jaw right below her ear. He even chuckled when he heard her slight gasp. “I must admit, I prefer to pay attention to you. He’s nowhere near as beautiful as you.”_ _

__Sally was infatuated. But she was also rational. She didn’t want to kiss him in front of her parents’ graves. She didn’t even know if she wanted to kiss him, gods were known to impregnate women and leave. She was barely an adult, nowhere near ready for a child, especially a demigod. And she knew gods never stayed, her mother had warned her about the nature of gods to bed a mortal then leave. Estelle Jackson had never spoken of Thanatos though, and the romantic within her told her he was different._ _

__The necklace burned against her chest._ _

__“Come on, dear.” Thanatos stood and helped her stand, a hand on the small of her back. “Let’s get you some coffee. You know, despite being the god of death I’m not actually the fondest of loitering in graveyards. Reminds me too much of work.”_ _

__“Is Hades still mad at you?” She tilted her head, smiling slightly. She desperately pushed down the part of herself that was becoming more and more attached to him._ _

__“Yes.” He laughed and shrugged. “He’s actually pouting at me now.” He lead her out of the graveyard, his robes flickering before her eyes and changing from robes into clothes similar to what he had worn on their first date. “But I really don’t mind. It’s worth it to be here with you.”_ _

__The two of them drank their coffee and Sally braided the white streak in her hair from Thanatos. It had been so easy to talk and ramble when she had been so upset and overwhelmed in the graveyard, but now a silence grew between them. It wasn’t exactly uncomfortable, not yet, but it was dangerously close. Thanatos didn’t seem to mind though. He looked as calm as ever and even seemed to radiate a sort of serene happiness._ _

__“You know, somehow with every passing second you grow more and more beautiful?” He reached out to run his fingers over the braided strand. “Most mortals are really rather boring—“_ _

__“Thanatos.” Sally gave him a look as she cut him off. “I would rather not be complimented by insulting others.”_ _

__“No, no!” He actually got somewhat flustered and his hand pulled away. “Words are honestly so hard, Athena may be stuck up at times but she can be an amazing wordsmith. Apollo too.” He cleared his throat, clearly wanting to get back on topic. He was adorable like this, he somewhat like a cat trying to pretend they hadn’t just spent an hour cuddled up to your side as you watched Disney movies. “What I meant is, some other mortals may look shockingly beautiful at first and draw the eye, but with time they quickly become normal. That’s what I meant, not exactly boring. Yet somehow, you never seem to do that. You’re beautiful, yet each moment only makes that beauty greater. I don’t understand it. Are you certain you don’t have godly blood within you?”_ _

__Thanatos had started to ramble and Sally leaned in. She meant to listen, really, but his eyes seemed to turn deeper and richer with his fervor and his lips were still so tempting. She had always heard of gods being the pursuers, the instigators, but Sally had always been somewhat brash and reckless, despite or perhaps because of all her love and care. She wasn’t one to sit in wait for others to make the move. When she devoured romance books as a young teen, frustration would always set in when the characters with obvious romantic tension would take the whole book or even multiple to get together. They would dance around each other._ _

__But weren’t they dancing around each other? It would be so easy to stop that dance. To dance together._ _

__“Sally? Sally?” Thanatos rested the back of his hand over her forehead and she leaned in instinctively. “You feel a bit warm. You looked lost, dear, despite being right here. Are you feeling alright?” He leaned in and it would be so easy to just tug him closer. But something, her own trepidation, stopped her._ _

__“I’m fine, Thanatos.” She wasn’t fine. When she was with him, her breaths felt too short. She was filled with both bravery and cowardice. He filled all her senses in a way that she loved and hated. “Just thinking. You really didn’t have to do all that for me...”_ _

__“Ah, but I did.” He leaned back and she wished he would’ve stayed. A smirk played on his lips as he spoke. “You see, darling, when you’re happy it makes my heart soar in a way it does not often do. And you cannot be happy as easily when you don’t eat well, when you’re worrying about things that can easily be taken care of. Let me treat you, for when I do so I am treating myself.” He pulled out his iPad as he spoke, swiping on the screen a few times. “Are you busy tomorrow, dear? Because I would love to take you somewhere, if you have the time and would grant me the honour.”_ _

__She was becoming addicted to him, she knew. She could already feel the sadness o him leaving despite him having not yet left. “That sounds perfect.” The idea of a date with him, even if not explicitly called a date, made her giddy. Sally had called herself reasonable in the past, but she was ruled by her heart. It was a fact that made itself evident when she dropped out of school and it was evident now._ _

__“I’ll pick you up at 5 then.” Thanatos stood and her chance at kissing him was gone, at least for now. He placed more than enough money on the table for their coffees. “I really must go.”_ _

__Sally smiled at him but looked away, not wanting to watch him go._ _

__He took her by surprise._ _

__He tasted of honey and smoke and her mother’s poppyseed cake. He was perfect._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I hope you’re liking it so far, I know this isn’t exactly a traditional pairing by any means. If you aren’t liking it, tell me why! I’m always looking for ways to improve my writing. Next chapter you’ll get to see Thanatos’s perspective on this whole matter.
> 
> I don’t have a plan yet for where I want to take this or how far I want to take it, but I always love to hear people’s ideas and sometimes they even inspire my own.


	3. THANATOS III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thanatos weighs in and I attempt to give hints to stuff.

Her beauty was that that was rarely seen in mortal women. Of course, it was still seen, so Thanatos didn’t pay too much attention to her, he had a job to do after all. Then she surprised him. She could see him. And her beauty didn’t fade one bit, not like so many others did.

He was ensnared from that first meeting.

She may not have known it, but in those moments he committed her soul to memory. The feel of it. Souls don’t smell, but it’s the closest sense a human has to describe the feeling of a soul. Her soul felt like sea salt on chocolate. Like the air on a beach. It was a buzzing in the back of his senses and he was addicted to her from that moment on. She burned like Greek fire in his veins. She was like drowning. He couldn’t get air and he didn’t want to.

He didn’t fall in love often. Rarely did Eros hit him, they had an agreement with both of them being the unfair deities they were. His first and greatest love would always be his dearest Macaria, goddess of blessed deaths, his blessed wife. She allowed him his mortal affairs every so often, but he never took one without her permission. She understood the desire to have a demigod, most gods had it hardwired into them. Some didn’t, Triton was a notable exception in his mind, but even she had had a demigod once before. 

The boy had died a blessed death in his sleep at the age of 70, never having faced a day of violence in his life.

His last love had been in the years before the First World War. Elizabeth had a beautiful soul of honeysuckle and thyme. They had a daughter, Victoria. But the war took all his time, there were so many deaths and even the Keres were overwhelmed by them all. 

Without him there, Victoria knew nothing of the powers that came so naturally for her. She had known nothing of their dangers. She had been playing hide and seek with some friends, she told him as he cradled her soul to his chest. She had discovered she could turn invisible. But she was only 5 years old, and within minutes her soul had fully crossed the threshold and could no longer return to the living. He reaped her personally, with all his essence in one place despite the backlog it created for months afterward. She enjoyed her life in Elysium, where she lived with her 6 other siblings and her mother. Elizabeth had brought herself to Thanatos the easy way within a month of her daughter’s death.

He mourned them. His wife lingered with him, comforting him and allowing him to slowly return to normal. He asked Eros to give him time, though he knew his friend has planned to. Most gods bed many men and women alike, but Thanatos was picky and created deep bonds with each of them. Sally would be no different, he knew.

He saw her again at the coffee shop. Seeing his symbol hanging off her chest, protecting her, made his chest rage with fire. He had felt panic when she knew so much. He tried not to fall in love with demigods. Their lives were always too short. He was unfair and reaped them, but he never wanted to reap his lovers early.

She said she wasn’t but he wasn’t sure. She later spoke of both her mother and her father. He made a note to himself on his iPad to find them eventually.

She was braver than his usual lovers. More reckless. He could tell she would look Zeus in the eye and list off all his flaws without care for the consequence. He both loved it and feared it, knowing that tendency could get her killed. She didn’t need his protection at all.

He carried her back to her home, her face nestled into his chest as he carried her as a groom did his bride. Her house made him sad, it was clear that she struggled financially, but he hadn’t realized how bad it was. His focus had never been economics, and Hades paid him far more than he needed. It made him happy to fill the house with food of the highest quality, to tuck the sheets around her sleeping form, and to meticulously fold his note into a butterfly. He would have to visit Ama-no-Uzume and thank her for teaching him origami.

He was in love with Sally Jackson, now all he had to do was convince her that it was a good idea to be in love with him too. He had never been rejected, but he vowed that if he ever was he would step back and deal with the heartbreak. He wasn’t like Zeus or Apollo. They were tenacious, they would rarely give up if they believed they still had a chance. 

He had fully been intending to do his work and give her time to write and process the fact that she had met a god and that he was so obviously in love with her. His heart fluttered like his butterflies anytime he thought of her. However, he had part of his consciousness paying attention to her, and when he noticed she was in a graveyard sobbing her heart out, he decided he had to intervene.

Listening to her speak about her parents at such length sounded sad, even to him. Rarely was he sad about death, even his children’s. He was sad they didn’t get more time to explore the land of the living, but the majority of them went to Elysium.

He personally believed it was a side effect of him bending the rules to spend time with them and their parent as they grew. He was more ancient than Zeus’s laws, and indeed more ancient than Zeus’s own father. Zeus may have ruled the gods now, but Thanatos knew that he was especially cognizant of the fragility of ruling and was willing to turn a blind eye more often than not.

Thanatos knew that even in this moment Zeus was using the guise of siring another child in his Roman form to spend time with his sole daughter, whether she knew it or not.

Ah. But Sally. She was the focal point of his heart now, and she was staring at him with eyes of the sea. He really did have to visit her parents in Elysium, and perhaps their parents wherever they were. Those eyes couldn’t have been mortal, even if Sally insisted they were.

Words were hard. One would think with all the poetry attached to his realm he would have some skill with words, yet he found himself tripping over them and annoying Sally. Though, her lips did twitch and her nose scrunch in a way that made him think perhaps she was just teasing him.

Teasing a god on their second date. Sally was special, whether she knew it or not.

Oh and she was perfect. Normally he’d ask his dear Macaria before moving forth in courting his mortal, but she had been as restless as a butterfly lately and was rarely home.

She tasted of coffee. It was unsurprising but he leaned in for more when she reciprocated, his hand slipping between her shoulder blades to support her. 

He pulled away and smiled down at her. “Now,” he said, his voice barely a grumble, “I really do have to go, darling.”

He laughed as he heard her grumble about how he was the one that kissed her. Perhaps it was true, but so be it. He melted into the shadows without another word.


End file.
